What Goes Up
by SpunSilk
Summary: Kolchak: The Night Stalker story. We both stared at number board above door which showed we were approaching the seventeenth floor, but not there yet. My mouth hung open for few seconds of shock as I tried to convince myself this wasn't happening. The stranger let out a slow breath with his jaw set hard. "Like a fly in his fist," were the first words he spoke out loud.
1. Chapter 1

**Carl is not mine, but I'm borrowing him for this story. Remember, reviewing earns good karma :-)**

**What Goes Up**

**By SpunSilk**

Part One

* * *

_If I have to listen to one more lame excuse from marketing, I won't be responsible for my own actions,_ I fumed. The entire 83rd floor, where my firm was located, was quiet at this hour, but there was noise enough in my head to more than make up for that. The elevator finally arrived and I walked on, feeling every one of the 14 hours I had worked that day. As soon as the doors closed, I thankfully slipped out of my pumps and rested my tired feet on the cool, smooth marble floor of the high-speed elevator. Mmmm. That felt so good. _I can finish the Hollander letter at home before I crash, _my mind continued to spin, even though my body had given up for the day,_ but I've got to talk to Dallas before I write the contract... _

The elevator slowed, stopped and a pleasant _ding!_ sounded.

The doors opened, and to my shock a man ran on, no – _lunged_ on, and dove for the 'close door' button which he pressed in rapid-fire. The doors slid silently closed while he watched out through the gap as it narrowed, as if someone were chasing him. I scanned the hallway myself, but saw no one. I was surprised and honestly a tad jared to watch all this; we have a high class high-rise and you just don't see riff-raff in the building.

Once the elevator was underway again, the stranger exhaled deeply, and pulling his hat far forward over his eyes, he slumped against the side wall, breathing hard.

Silence.

It wasn't 20 floors before he was back on full alert again, watching the floors count down in lights over the door like his very life depended on it. He gave the impression of a coiled spring, ready to shoot out the door even as we made our way down the building.

I pressed a bit farther into my half of the elevator and tried to avoid looking at him, but my curious eyes were drawn by his out-of-style rumbled suit – white – together with white running shoes, I kid you not. A straw hat finished the ensemble, and he held not an attache case but rather a lumpy canvas bag in one fist. Unreal. If I hadn't been so uncomfortable, I'm sure I would have been amused.

He glance at me for the first time, frowned, and said nothing. I glanced away. Silence hung between us for many floors. The uncomfortable ride was almost at an end when a sharp jolt nearly knocked me off my feet, causing a squeak of surprise from me and a cry of dismay from the stranger. Our speed disappeared at a shocking rate, then vanished altogether.

The elevator had stopped dead.

We both stared at number board above door which showed we were approaching the seventeenth floor, but not there yet. My mouth hung open for few seconds of shock as I tried to convince myself this wasn't happening. The stranger let out a slow breath with his jaw set hard, and his eyes narrow.

"_Like a fly in his fist_," were the first words he spoke out loud. I was instantly nervous.

"Don't worry, These things happen," I said, ill-at-ease. I picked up the emergency-call phone and pressed the button. He busied himself with _feeling the walls_ of the elevator and watching wide-eyed as if he expected them to do something other than just stand there.

Watching this, I pressed the button a few more times in quick succession.

While I tried unsuccessfully to raise someone on the phone, he rummaged in his canvas bag and pulled out a tall white taper candle. Yes, a white taper candle. The stranger – with emphasis on 'strange' – lit it with a lighter from his pocket.

"What are you doing?" I asked, uneasy.

"Holding him at bay," he answered simply.

Okay, it was established: I was stuck in an elevator with a Crazy Guy. I pressed the call-button with rapid-fire.


	2. Chapter 2

**What Goes Up**

**By SpunSilk**

Part Two

* * *

The moments dragged into minutes, then into hours.

Without another word to me, the stranger had sat down on the floor and had put all his attention into a dusty old book he had pulled from the canvas bag. I had eventually ended up sitting on the floor, too, but had kept a vigilant watch on him. A gal can't be too careful. The candle, now melted-wax attached to the middle of the marble floor had burned down about a quarter of its height. I sat on the floor with my laptop trying to think about the Hollander contract, but completely failed. We had, without discussing it, established a 'his' and a 'my' side of the elevator. I had been on strict duty guarding this division from the beginning, but he only had eyes for his book.

_He's probably Homeless... _I reasoned, noticing the condition of his suit – and the maniac way he clutched that bag. ... _And batty as a bedbug._

There was no raising _anyone_ on the phone. I was prepping a scathing letter in my head; the front desk was supposed to be manned no matter _what_ the hour. What did we pay our fees for after all?! I stole another glance at the stranger. He poured over the book with an intensity that surprised me. Even with out speaking, I could feel this fellow was a force to be reckoned with. And his personality was far too large for the small space we shared. His intense body language and actions had convinced me that this guy was (as my knitting circle would say) definitely one skein short of a finished sweater.

"What is it there you're reading?" I asked gently. The book looked positively ancient, crumbly even.

"Polynesian Anthropology" he answered without looking away from the dusty book. "Kava-nusjkatilla... He's a sort of a... Tuvalu Beelzebub."

"Sorry I asked," I said truthfully.

"You shouldn't be. It's important," he answered. "He's was on my tail up there."

It was some fantasy-life this guy had. "Why?"

"I've got something that belongs to him," he held up the canvas bag with a wicked grin.

He was a thief! Now it clicked. That's why he had been running, so anxious to flee. "Well, the jig's up now, with you stuck in here till help comes. Why don't you just give it back? Hmm?" I asked reasonably.

"_No!_" he declared, with more emotion than I thought was warranted. "No more murders! This madness ends _here_," he slapped his knee for emphasis.

Murders? _Bloodshed?!_ I caught my breath. Any thoughts I had toyed with about him being benign, vanished. This madness ends here? I didn't see any madness _ending, _only_ raging_. I pressed farther into my wall.

"The candle's blessed. It will keep him off until I can puzzle this out..." he returned to leafing through the book.

"Oh, I'm not worried."

He fixed me with an intense glare. "You _aught _to be, Honey. Your sweet young body will be tastier than _mine_."

I bristled. There it was, out in the open now. His intentions were now clear. "I'm **not** your 'Honey', _Buster_!" I hissed at him. I rustled for the spray-can of mace I carried in my stylish purse. He looked up in surprise, and blinked at me. I've always read that rape is a crime of domination; I must not appear the victim. I stood and pulled up to my best non-submissive height. "I'm a_ vice-president _at Toakner Associates in this building! Who are you? Huh? You the hell are _you_?!"

He looked confused. "My title? Okay..." he considered. "I'm... '_The Guy Who Has Beelzebub's Damned Crystal in a Bag'._ How's that?" He shot me a disgusted glance and resumed his reading. "You figure they can fit that on a name-plate for me?"

"I got _mace!_ Right here. See? Keep your distance!"

He first looked bewildered, then scowled as he took my meaning. "You got a lot more to be afraid of in this elevator than _me._" he said darkly.

"I seriously doubt that!"

"Seriously doubt whatever you _like_, Honey." His attention returned to the book. "But let me read."


	3. Chapter 3

**What Goes Up**

**by SpunSilk**

Part 3

* * *

As the candle was burning at half-height, the electric lights blinked out suddenly. Our eyes locked. The stranger's eyes went narrow and he slowly scanned the dim elevator. The candle gave its dim but steady light.

"How many more systems failures can we have tonight?!" I fumed. "This is crazy. Nobody answers the phone, the elevator car is stuck, and now once your candle burns out, we'll be in the bloody _dark_!"

"We'll be in something bloodier than that..."

"Maybe if we open the top of the car... you could do like on Mission Impossible–"

He shook his head. "Expose myself? No, thank you. I'm pretty sure this metal box is the only reason I'm still alive right now." He glanced up again to the ceiling. "_Uh-oh_."

I glanced up, too. All four corners were oddly white. He was on his feet in a flash, feeling the walls up high. He jerked his hands back, and glanced at the candle, back to the ceiling corners, and swore under his breath.

"What is that?" I asked.

"Condensation. It's frost."

"That's impossible. It's not that cold in here."

"Be patient, it's coming," he answered, distracted. "He's a clever cuss. He's found another way, not a frontal-attack; he can slip this in from the sides... Different means to the same end..." The whitish patches were growing in size.

"The end being...?"

"He wants my backside."

I shook my head. I wasn't about to endorse his mental delusions. "I'm sure there's a reasonable explanation..."

He looked at me without answering for a few beats. "Sure. Because everything in the world can be explained in simple, reasonable ways, right?" He sounded bitter. "Nice world you live in."

"The air-conditioning is on the fritz as well." I proposed.

"Uh-_huh_."

The temperature actually did start to fall, just like he had predicted. First it was too cool. Soon after, it felt like a refrigerator in the elevator. This made no sense at all. Even if the air-conditioner was on full bore, it wouldn't be built with the compressor capable of hitting this temperature. I was soon shivering. I sat on the floor, miserable, and wrapped my arms around my knees, trying to conserve as much heat as possible.

He looked up at me and from his book (where he had been flipping pages with renewed vigor) and shook his head. He got up, removed his suit-coat, and to my surprise placed it on my shoulders. "No," I chattered, "You need it..."

"Now who's unreasonable? A scrawny thing like yourself will chill out long before I will." He pushed the hat onto my head as well, but that was more of a gesture than any actual insulation.

I shrugged into the too-large coat, drinking in the body warmth it held for a short time, and pulled it tight one and a half times around me. The walls were white nearly a quarter the way down to the floor by now, and they were _cold_. I moved closer to the center of the car to warm my hands over the small candle flame.

"Look, I'm really sorry about this," he said. I looked up at him. He looked honestly pained. "This didn't need to involve you." He said, sadly. "You're what they call...mm... _collateral_ damage." He clenched his jaw to silence the chattering that was starting.

"You s-sound like you're at war."

"Yeah," he said without elaboration. "I should have grabbed a different elevator... You could be home by now safe and sound... I'm _sorry_." He moved in to avoid the wall as well. The frost line was just inches away from the floor by now.

My frazzled mind did not want to accept what my skin was telling it. I chattered, "It's the temperature of a _freezer_ in here! _This makes no sense at all!_"

"Welcome to my world." he shivered, and he returned his attention to the dusty book.


	4. Chapter 4

**What Goes Up**

**By SpunSilk**

Part 4

* * *

"Ah-HA!" The stranger slapped the book, jarring me awake. He jabbed the book vigorously with his index finger. "**Here** is s-something! It's got to be a reference to _electro-magnetism_, it's _got_ to! What else would explain it?!"

"What's g-got to?" I asked in a fog.

He was clumsily fumbling back in the canvas bag. "You want your air-conditioning g-g-glitch to stop, Honey?" he grinned, "Watch _this_!" He extracted a digital camera from the bag, but when he activated the screen, his face fell. He rummaged again, frowning, and brought out a digital recorder. But his face fell once more when he turned it on.

"What are you d-d-doing?" I chattered.

He hesitated, then raised his eyebrows innocently. "You g-g-got anything in there with a full b-battery, Honey?"

"My lap-t-t-top..."

"Will you l-l-let me have the battery?" he asked. "I h-h-have to warn you, though, I might _f-f-fry_ it...

None of this made sense, but I was beyond caring. "S-sure... j-j-just let me... save." I fumbled with the odd appendages that looked like my fingers, trying to get them to hit the right keys.

When I was done, he took it from me with a grin. "N-n-now let's see if I can do s-s-some _saving_, myself!" He snapped the battery unit from the computer, and with one clumsy motion, emptied the entire contents of his bag all over the floor.

That bag held the weirdest assortment of trinkets I had ever seen; bells, bones, strings, small cloth bundles – a few wrapped in copper wire. And one more thing; a large orange crystal that had been set in a heavy decorated setting, just the size of a man's palm. For some strange reason, I disliked the thing the moment I set eyes on it. And I'm not one to take offense at crystals, I'm here to tell you. It made me _feel_... contaminated, to see it. It was the oddest sensation in my life. I actually felt a strong _emotion_ just in the presence of this thing.

I started to breathe heavy with repulsion, but either the stranger didn't feel it, or he just handled it better than me. He unwound the wire from two bundles, wrapped then tightly around the crystal-thing and, with a wink to me and a deep breath he held the wires hard against the crystal with one hand, and with his other hand plunged the wires into the battery energy ports to complete the circuit.

The elevator itself shuttered, and I cried out, thinking we were now having an earthquake on top of everything else. But a high-pitched squeal accompanied the shuddering – intense and painful and loud. My hands flew up to cover my ears. I yelled inarticulate protest.

The stranger grimaced with the piercing squeal too, and grit his teeth in determination, both hands now resolutely on the crystal, pressing the wire into contact with it. To my amazement, the crystal started to glow; we both turned away from it as the light became too intense to take. This is when I noticed water running down all four walls of the elevator, and following it, what looked like _blood_. It was too much to take in. I screamed between my clamped hands.

A flash lit the whole elevator from the direction of the crystal, still clamped tightly in the stranger's hands, and the light, the squeal, and the flame of the candle disappeared. We were plunged into darkness and silence so thick it hurt my frazzled nerves.

"Ha-HA!" came a cry of glee from the stranger. I felt him roll over onto his back and laugh heartily. My skin started to prickle as the welcome warmth slowly started returning feeling to my fingers and toes. "Honey! The phone will work now, but you'll have to be the one to call; my hands are burnt." He laughed again. "Call up your maintenance men and let's have them open up this can!" he sang out. "It's _**over**_."


End file.
